Fish Werx
Active Member
Here it is! What you have all been waiting for! The most amazing, splendeferous, confusticating show on earth! Oh, wait... Its just my tank build! Haha! I finally got it!
To think, about 3 years ago I started with a 30g sumpless hand me down!
I just picked up a slightly used, but none the worse for wear 300g acrylic with triple ghost overflows and a crazy amount of useless garbage! LOL! Dont get me wrong, I basically stole this thing from the poor guy. He was in a bind, getting ready to move and had no plans on taking this behemoth with him. So, I offered a ridiculously low amount, he countered with the original asking price.... I bade him good day and proceeded to walk out the door. Low and behold he started talking about lowering the price very quickly! We settled on a number that was amicable to both parties, although Im sure he would have been happier with more, I sure would have been with less! Haha!
The bones are good, great even. The skimmer was really what sealed the deal for me. A Reef Octo 300sss! But for the most part the accessories are no bueno.
Anyway, here is how it was before I took possession of it as we were setting up to tear it down.
Not horrible, but as you can see, not much to it. It had 3 metal halide fixtures above it, along with some LED lights. I think they didnt work? As they were already moved to the floor before we got there. Anyway, the lighting made no difference to me.
The stand, if you want to call it that was not the best thing we had seen in a while. The welds were garbage, no penetration. I think the steel tubing stuck together due to strictly the amount of buildup there was! Haha! I am definitely fabbing my own custom stand at my shop. That way I know I can park a car on it. Which, if yo think about it, is what I am going to do weight wise!
In the pic I am preparing to start removing the liverock, sand and critters here. It doesnt look like it, but there were about 24 fish plus other inverts in there! And we were only told about 11 of them. As you can imagine, I was relieved that we brought 10 extra buckets with lids and fish boxes just in case...
3 yellow tangs - ~4"
1 coral beauty - ~3"
1 flame angel - ~3"
1 flame back - ~3"
1 diamond goby - ~5"
1 lawnmower blenny - ~4"
3 normal ocillaris clowns - ~2.5"
1 tomato clown - ~2.5"
1 clarkii clown - ~4"
1 maroon clown - ~3"
2 snowflake clowns - ~3"
1 B+W clown - ~2.5"
3 blue green chromis - ~2.5"
2 blue damsels - ~1"
1 sargent major damsel - ~3"
1 picasso trigger - ~5"
1 sea urchin - ~4"
3 peacock mantus shrimp - ~3" (I know! What the heck?!?!)
1 coral banded shrimp - ~3"
1 sea scallop - ~4"
1 condy anemone - ~6"
Plus snails, crabs and other plenty of bristleworms. Glad I brought my gloves!
Seriously, to this guys credit or sheer dumb luck, these fish had all been in the system for over a year together.... I have no idea how?
Live rock removed. Livestock sorted. Mag 18 to the rescue. We pumped the water we didnt need for transport right out the back door! Along with as much of the sand as possible. I think the guy literally went to the beach here in NC and shoveled a bunch of sand into buckets and brought it home. It was silica based sand if Im not mistaken, and had tons of local to us shells and such.... So, out the door it went!
Also, the live rock was FL shelf rock? It had so many muscles and clams growing on it, it was kind of cool. But it was also covered in majano anemones and other nasty buggers. Soooooo.....
Fairly empty. Now to tear apart the sump. Ughhhh.....
The skimmer couldnt have been cleaned since it was installed. I swear, Ive never seen so much build up! It was over an inch thick! And the lid had mildew and mold growing in it...
I wish I would have taken a pic to show you. But believe me when I say it was insane!
Here it is cleaned up though! So choice! I am an equipment nut anyway, so this geeks me out!
Fortunately, one of my very good friends owns a pretty sizeable moving company here in town. So, like a true friend, I asked to borrow one of his moving trucks and equipment. He did me one better! He added one of his star moving crew guys to tag along. so glad he did! This dude had more heavy lifting and heavy moving experience than anyone else I have ever met. He was a true blessing on this trip!
To think, about 3 years ago I started with a 30g sumpless hand me down!
I just picked up a slightly used, but none the worse for wear 300g acrylic with triple ghost overflows and a crazy amount of useless garbage! LOL! Dont get me wrong, I basically stole this thing from the poor guy. He was in a bind, getting ready to move and had no plans on taking this behemoth with him. So, I offered a ridiculously low amount, he countered with the original asking price.... I bade him good day and proceeded to walk out the door. Low and behold he started talking about lowering the price very quickly! We settled on a number that was amicable to both parties, although Im sure he would have been happier with more, I sure would have been with less! Haha!
The bones are good, great even. The skimmer was really what sealed the deal for me. A Reef Octo 300sss! But for the most part the accessories are no bueno.
Anyway, here is how it was before I took possession of it as we were setting up to tear it down.
Not horrible, but as you can see, not much to it. It had 3 metal halide fixtures above it, along with some LED lights. I think they didnt work? As they were already moved to the floor before we got there. Anyway, the lighting made no difference to me.
The stand, if you want to call it that was not the best thing we had seen in a while. The welds were garbage, no penetration. I think the steel tubing stuck together due to strictly the amount of buildup there was! Haha! I am definitely fabbing my own custom stand at my shop. That way I know I can park a car on it. Which, if yo think about it, is what I am going to do weight wise!
In the pic I am preparing to start removing the liverock, sand and critters here. It doesnt look like it, but there were about 24 fish plus other inverts in there! And we were only told about 11 of them. As you can imagine, I was relieved that we brought 10 extra buckets with lids and fish boxes just in case...
3 yellow tangs - ~4"
1 coral beauty - ~3"
1 flame angel - ~3"
1 flame back - ~3"
1 diamond goby - ~5"
1 lawnmower blenny - ~4"
3 normal ocillaris clowns - ~2.5"
1 tomato clown - ~2.5"
1 clarkii clown - ~4"
1 maroon clown - ~3"
2 snowflake clowns - ~3"
1 B+W clown - ~2.5"
3 blue green chromis - ~2.5"
2 blue damsels - ~1"
1 sargent major damsel - ~3"
1 picasso trigger - ~5"
1 sea urchin - ~4"
3 peacock mantus shrimp - ~3" (I know! What the heck?!?!)
1 coral banded shrimp - ~3"
1 sea scallop - ~4"
1 condy anemone - ~6"
Plus snails, crabs and other plenty of bristleworms. Glad I brought my gloves!
Seriously, to this guys credit or sheer dumb luck, these fish had all been in the system for over a year together.... I have no idea how?
Live rock removed. Livestock sorted. Mag 18 to the rescue. We pumped the water we didnt need for transport right out the back door! Along with as much of the sand as possible. I think the guy literally went to the beach here in NC and shoveled a bunch of sand into buckets and brought it home. It was silica based sand if Im not mistaken, and had tons of local to us shells and such.... So, out the door it went!
Also, the live rock was FL shelf rock? It had so many muscles and clams growing on it, it was kind of cool. But it was also covered in majano anemones and other nasty buggers. Soooooo.....
Fairly empty. Now to tear apart the sump. Ughhhh.....
The skimmer couldnt have been cleaned since it was installed. I swear, Ive never seen so much build up! It was over an inch thick! And the lid had mildew and mold growing in it...
I wish I would have taken a pic to show you. But believe me when I say it was insane!
Here it is cleaned up though! So choice! I am an equipment nut anyway, so this geeks me out!
Fortunately, one of my very good friends owns a pretty sizeable moving company here in town. So, like a true friend, I asked to borrow one of his moving trucks and equipment. He did me one better! He added one of his star moving crew guys to tag along. so glad he did! This dude had more heavy lifting and heavy moving experience than anyone else I have ever met. He was a true blessing on this trip!
